


warped genesis

by kurohswife



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Continuation, Gen, Horror, Implied Kaneki/Sasaki, Psychological Horror, Spoilers for RE kinda, Universe Alteration, competition entry, competition winner
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-05
Updated: 2015-09-05
Packaged: 2018-04-19 03:45:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4731671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kurohswife/pseuds/kurohswife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That hunted predator who tastes the forbidden ambrosia, to a hellish existence is condemned. </p>
<p>[[Winner of 2015 SMASH! Convention Fanfiction Competition: Short Fic category]]</p>
            </blockquote>





	warped genesis

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone ^^ I edited this a little bit, you can see all entries [here](http://smashcon.dreamwidth.org/40376.html). I'm super duper pleased to win this :'3 My prize was commissioned artwork which I will link if I'm allowed ^0^
> 
> Edit: thank you [Nic](https://mangalover93.wordpress.com) for being my beta reader...! 
> 
>  
> 
> [Prize was sword boy commission yay~](http://lesovyart.tumblr.com/post/131118812569/taroutachi-and-kogi-as-a-commission-for-another)

_“My life closed twice before its close;_  
It yet remains to see  
If immortality unveil  
A third event to me,  
So huge, so hopeless to conceive  
As these that twice befell.  
Parting is all we know of heaven,  
And all we need of hell.” — Emily Dickinson

_I._

”H…hello? Hello?” Haise’s voice is tremulous, uncertain before the pitch darkness that invokes a hammering of his heart. His hand blindly gropes the air before him.

_”What are you looking for?”_ A cool, familiar voice asks him. Haise turns around. The darkness peels away, revealing an ornate chair with plush vermillion stuffing, the back engraved with red-stained eyeballs. Upon it perches a smiling horned owl, who questions him again.

_”What are you looking for?”_

Haise tries to open his mouth, tries to stammer out a half-hearted reply. His own words are drowned out by static before they morph, bleeding into the noise that emanates from the owl’s beak. Haise retreats unsteadily, gaze focussed upon the owl. It looks at Haise curiously.

 

Suddenly its form seems to writhe before it explodes in a fit of feathers, chunks of bloodied flesh and centipedes. Despite his distance, Haise’s skin prickles with thousands of tiny feet as they crawl over his skin and into his orifices, preventing him from crying out. He staggers backwards, but his back doesn’t hit the floor—

_II._

Haise bolts upright from his bed before bile rises in his throat. He stumbles to the bathroom in a hazed frenzy and throws up in the toilet, heaving breaths echoing against the tiles and ceramic before gradually settling. He splashes cold water against his heated face and groggily glances into the mirror. Haise yells when the image of the centipede-infested owl flashes before his eyes. He stops shortly, remembering it is an illusion and nothing more.

Regardless, the nape of his neck prickles. 

Though it is early, Haise decides that he may as well get ready for work. He frowns as he bites into his toast, the taste like rotting cardboard. Its fibres peppered with seeds cling to the inside of his throat, akin to the centipedes of his nightmare. He spits out the bread into a tissue, deciding to forego breakfast. He takes a sip of the scalding coffee before he spits that out too with disgust. Did he accidentally add rancid milk? The sweet aroma of the coffee cannot mask the chalky, sweaty taste of what must be curdled milk. He had somehow forgotten to replace it after all… His appetite hadn’t been good since the operation for the kagune reinforcement a week ago, really. And after the raid yesterday afternoon…

Haise shudders before making himself a new cup of coffee. He sips this one in peace.

_III._

Today is mostly desk work, the routine that follows a successful raid, and Haise sits obediently at his desk, filling out the paperwork.

One section attracts his attention: “ _State of the ghoul’s corpse [see attached images]_ ”. As he turns to the appendix to check the autopsy report (always a rather distasteful part of the paperwork, but must be verified by the investigator responsible), Haise nearly chokes. Little is left of the One Eyed Owl’s corpse, but of what remains, there are many vicious bite marks.

Disjointed memories flash past his eyes. The One Eyed Owl seemingly grinning at him before raising a kagune that slashes at Mutsuki in a blur of motion. Pure darkness, with Haise lying on the ground, before a hand with black fingernails grasps his own hand and pulls him up, losing Haise in familiar heterochromatic eyes. Unadulterated rage and brazen instinct that fuels his every single movement. The taste of rotting flesh on his tongue. The sound of unnaturally high-pitched screams.

”Are you right?” asks Shirazu in concern. Haise looks up at him, pulled back to reality. “It’s… it’s alright you know. You can leave the paperwork till tomorrow or something, blame it on me or whatever, it’s not right to bottle it up and soldier on. You… you deserve a break after what happened there.”

”Happened where?” Haise asks weakly.

Shirazu gulps, his expression one of guilt. “Look, don’t blame yourself, Mutsuki wouldn’t have wanted it. I’m certain you did all that you could, no one could have expected that Owl to surprise you guys…”

_Oh, that’s right…_

Shirazu’s babbling fades into background noise. Haise groans, his head throbbing with pain as his ears fill with static.

_IV._

The darkness seems uniform until Haise furrows his brow, staring at one point. It is then that he realises it is undulating, millions upon millions of distant eyes with onyx sclera and crimson irises. They flutter at him coquettishly, beckoning him as he tries to pull back from them. His back hits a muscled wall as slim arms and bony kagune wrap around Haise.

”What are you looking for?” Kaneki’s voice whispers into his ear. 

”L-let me go!” Haise tries to struggle against the iron clad grip.

”You needn’t worry about that question at all.” 

Haise pauses, surprised.

”What you need to worry about is that room you are in right now. They’re planning to operate on you again… and it won’t be successful. So you should wake up, Haise Sasaki. Or should I say…”

He awakes in the CCG’s hospital ward, the monitors beeping. Looking around, he doesn’t see anyone in the room. He turns to the vitals screen. Sluggish with medication, his mind finally registers the abnormally high level of RC cells being displayed. Attached to his arm are tubes, one connected to a bag of RC cell suppressants. Against his better judgement, Haise rips these tubes off and stumbles out of bed. He needs to escape.

His gown flaps around him ridiculously as he runs through the halls. The alarm starts sounding. In the distance, organised voices issue commands. He was the hunter, but is now the hunted. Or was he the prey all along?

Without warning, his head throbs again. Deliberate footsteps, familiar and approaching, echo through the sterile corridor.

”Haise Sasaki…” The man, once his respected mentor, now looks at Haise gravely. “No. You are Kaneki Ken, are you not? I did not truly think we would meet again.” Arima’s voice is as chilly as the air conditioning in the hospital ward.

”You’re wrong!” Haise says. Every nerve in his body is on edge, warning him to not approach the renowned god of death. So Haise turns, running in the direction that he came from. But it is not long before fury overwhelms him, causing him to keel over and clutch at his temple. His consciousness fades into the pitch darkness once more.

_V._

It seems as if he is floating over the floor, running purely on brutal instinct. His limbs lash out but he cannot see - he breathes the scent of sweet human blood but he is deaf to their screams. Yet, flashes of lucidity occur — expressions of familiar people (colleagues? Friends? Family?) contorted in agony and pain.

_”What are you looking for?”_

Oh, he is a predator hunted by the God of Death — failed Adam moulded in His image and yet still dares to defy Him. Fallen angel or lowly beast, he knows not what he is, but that he must escape His retribution.

_”What are you looking for?”_

It does not occur to him why He is not chasing him. At least not until he finds himself in the 13th ward and Haise, no, Kaneki, realises why — the taste of sweet, sweet blood lingering on his tastebuds.

_”What are you looking for?”_

Not even He is invincible - yet in tasting the forbidden ambrosia, the predator discards salvation and comprehends that its life is one eternally condemned to purgatory for violating its promise to its maker.

_”…forgiveness…”_

_end_


End file.
